In surgical operations in general there are in some situations need for joining two separate instruments to a combined functionality. For example, a surgical tool such as a guide tube to be inserted in the body of a patient may need to be fastened to a handle to allow a surgeon to hold the guide tube in a firm grip.
In brain surgery and other surgery, navigation enabling tools are used to assist the surgeon in positioning surgical instruments within the body of a patient. For example, ultrasound guided surgical tools are used together with positioning sensor navigation tools for enabling the surgeon to know the exact position of the tip of the surgical tool inside the body of a patient. Such a navigation tool is typically attached to an ultrasound probe or another surgical instrument.
Navigation tools for brain surgery typically include tracking markers, which enable the surgeon to control the coordinates of the tip of the surgical tool in space, notably out of sight inside a patient's body. The tracking markers may include active emitters and/or passive reflective markers that emit or reflect electromagnetic, magnetic or acoustic signals to one or more tracking devices. The tracking device is used to determine the position of the tracking markers and with calibration the actual position of the tip of a surgical tool attached to the navigation tool with the tracking markers. In the course of a surgical operation the surgeon often has a need to switch between different medical instruments that are connected to the navigation tool.
In order to be able to change between surgical instruments connected to the tracking marker and to enable sterilization of the surgical tools, there is a need for a flexible and easily attachable and releasable attachment device for adjoining medical instruments.
The attachment of a tracking marker to a surgical instrument is preferably a reversible attachment because of the need of using different types of navigation enabling tools and also because of the need for removal of the navigation tools for sterilization of the surgical tools.